The future of The Walking Dead begins with Judith Grimes

The new era of The Walking Dead without Rick Grimes begins now with Judith Grimes leading the way and stepping into a main role.

The Walking Dead “What Comes After” ushered in a new era for the show with the departure of Rick Grimes and a time jump that confirmed the future of The Walking Dead belongs to the women of The Walking Dead.

Presumably after Rick Grimes was washed away among the walkers and then spirited away to the helicopter community Michonne took over the leadership of Alexandria and continued to build on what she and Rick had started. It only makes sense that Michonne would continue the work that was the most important to her and to Rick – building a future that Carl would have been proud of. She told Negan that her sons were gone but that the future would be better for her daughter and knowing Michonne she spent those years during the time jump building that future.

She also spent it preparing her daughter, Judith, for the apocalypse world. After the time jump Judith appears, older, and already a solid fighter. She helps save the new group with some shots from Rick’s Colt pistol and she has a katana on her back and Carl’s sheriff hat. Judith Grimes is going to be character that continues the legacy of Rick and Carl while bringing us all into the new era of The Walking Dead.

Judith may still be young, but the future of the apocalypse world is going to be female led and that’s exciting to see on a genre show.

The First Apocalypse Child

In the setting of the show Judith is the first child that has never known any other world but the post-apocalypse world. It will be interesting to see how that shapes her view of the world and her view of civilization.

Michonne has obviously prepared her well to survive in that world, and since she will be the future of the civilization and possibly the future of the show hopefully they will show some flashbacks of her growth during the time jump.

When Carl was killed off last season it was assumed that Henry would take Carl’s storyline as the heir to Rick Grimes’ story but now it seems that Judith is the one who will carry on the Grimes’ family legacy. That follows a trend in genre TV where women and girls have been at the forefront. Fear The Walking Dead also has shifted to a female led narrative with Alicia taking a lead role and playing the big sister role for Charlie.

Hopefully now that the number one scripted drama on cable and the leader of genre TV has embraced fully developed roles for women and girls other genre TV shows will follow suit and give women the powerful, multi-dimensional, and story-rich arcs that have been absent in genre TV for too long.

The new era of The Walking Dead continues next week with the first post-Rick Grimes episode “Who Are You Now”.